The dramatic expose of how the University of Oregon sold its soul to Nike--and what that means for the future of academics and college sports.
Joshua Hunt is a contributing writer at the California Sunday Magazine and a former foreign correspondent for Reuters in Tokyo. His work has also appeared in the New Yorker, the New York Times, and the Atavist Magazine, and he is a graduate of Columbia Journalism School, where he was a fellow at the Stabile Center for Investigative Journalism and a recipient of the Lynton Fellowship in Book Writing.
"Remarkable... [a] page-turner... [that] reads as suspenseful as a
late drive in the fourth quarter to win a championship."-LARB
"A searing indictment"-INSIDE HIGHER ED
"Hunt's book is worthwhile-a cautionary tale for college officials
to avoid the siren song of corporate money targeted at big
sports."-THE NATIONAL REVIEW
"Engaging...with important insight into contemporary
problems."-NEW YORK JOURNAL OF BOOKS
"An eye-opening account about how the University of Oregon had sold
its soul to Nike and how it affects higher education and college
athletics in general."-KENTUCKY FORWARD
"Providing fascinating and alarming insight into how other public
universities have emulated similar practices in obtaining
endorsement deals and partnerships at the expense of their values,
this is for readers of sports journalism and true stories of
corporate America." -BOOKLIST REVIEWS
"In this fascinating, candid tale, Hunt exposes Nike's astonishing
transformation of the University of Oregon into a modern American
university - in other words, a power center of education, wealth,
and college football unlike other institutions of learning across
the globe." -Vanessa Grigoriadis, author of Blurred Lines:
Rethinking Sex, Power, and Consent
"In this illuminating case study Joshua Hunt connects the dots
between endorsement deals and campus sexual assault. University of
Nike is a must read for anyone worried about the higher-education
industrial complex, which should be all of us." -Malcolm Harris,
author of Kids These Days
"A page-turning work of investigative reporting. Much of it details
the perfidy of Nike and its founder Phil Knight. But, as the title
suggests, this book is also about the damage that America's
tax-cutting mania and contempt for government has done to its
public, land-grant universities . . . As Hunt shows, by starving
institutions like the University of Oregon of resources, an unholy
alliance of right-wingers and market-worshipping neoliberals has
pushed colleges into the hands of corporate puppeteers like Nike.
You need to read this compelling and disturbing book." -Samuel
G. Freedman, author of Breaking The Line
"Through diligent and deep-dive reporting, Hunt reveals how the
University of Oregon sold its soul to a corporation. University of
Nike is a damning indictment-it should be read by anyone who still
believes in the privatization of public institutions. This book is
proof that it's a bad idea when universities become shills for
billionaires." -Dale Maharidge, co-author of the Pulitzer
Prize-winning And Their Children After Them
"Joshua Hunt has weaved an amazing tale of power, greed and deceit.
This should be a textbook for anyone who wants to learn the truth
about what's happening to public universities throughout the
country." -Andy Boyle, author of Adulthood for
Beginners
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